tisdag 19 augusti 2014

Om våld. rapport från kolonierna.

"[9. Raw Materials] Capitalism, in its early days, saw in the colonies a source of raw materials which, once turned into manufactured goods, could be distributed on the European market. After a phase of accumulation of capital, capitalism has today come to modify its conception of the profit-earning capacity of a commercial enterprise. A blind domination founded on slavery is not economically speaking worthwhile. The colonies have become a market. Today, the colonized countries’ national struggle crops up in a completely new international situation. What the factory-owners and finance magnates of the mother country expect from their government is not that it should decimate the colonial peoples, but that it should safeguard their own “legitimate interests.” The private companies put pressure on their own governments at least to set up military bases, for the purpose of assuring protection of their interests. Thus there exists a sort of detached complicity between capitalism and the violent forces which blaze up in colonial territory. For centuries the capitalists have behaved in the underdeveloped world like nothing more than war criminals. Deportations, massacres, forced labor, and slavery have been the main methods used by capitalism to increase its wealth, its gold or diamond reserves, and to establish its power. Not long ago, Nazism transformed the whole of Europe into a veritable colony. The governments of European nations called for reparations and demanded the wealth which had been stolen from them: cultural treasures, pictures, sculptures, and stained glass have been given back to their owners. The wealth of the imperial countries is our wealth too..."